Difference between revisions of "Week 10 Questions/Comments"
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Thelma Jennings essay, "The Sexual Exploitation of African American Slave Women," really hits home all the major points of this topic we discussed in class. Like the idea of female slaves having a tougher life than male slaves because not only did they have to do the work equal of men, but they also had to bear and raise children and also "cope with sexual abuse" by their masters. And the idea of "slave breeding" affected the family life too - it "made it very difficult for couples to establish family relationships." The whole female gender role system we often place on women of modern times and white women of the period is completely disrupted and destroyed for black slave women. -- Vanessa Smiley | Thelma Jennings essay, "The Sexual Exploitation of African American Slave Women," really hits home all the major points of this topic we discussed in class. Like the idea of female slaves having a tougher life than male slaves because not only did they have to do the work equal of men, but they also had to bear and raise children and also "cope with sexual abuse" by their masters. And the idea of "slave breeding" affected the family life too - it "made it very difficult for couples to establish family relationships." The whole female gender role system we often place on women of modern times and white women of the period is completely disrupted and destroyed for black slave women. -- Vanessa Smiley | ||
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| + | I was a bit confused by something in the reading that seemed contradictory. In the author's description of the "Rose William's Story" piece, he explains that it was in a woman slave's self-interest to have children because it increased her value as a slave and thereby diminished the likelihood of her sale and separation from family members. Then in the essay by Thelma Jennings she talks about women who practiced crude methods of birth control and abortion and inducing miscarriages as a form of passive resistance. She explains that this was common in a time when childbirth was dangerous and children could be sold at the master's whim. So which is it? Can it be both? --Alex K. | ||
